Customer background 
Geddes Window Systems Ltd is a thriving make-to-order joinery business based in Halkirk, Caithness. Its core clientele comprises Local Councils and Housing Associations involved in new-build projects throughout the UK. 

In autumn 2001, to cope with demand, the company's factory was increased from 20,000 to 25,000 square feet. As a result of foreign competition, the company has since added door manufacture to its portfolio.

Around this time, and as turnover began to increase from around £500,000 per year to around £3 million, the company realised that its production scheduling methodology had to change.

Before...the requirement
Geddes' Managing Director, Kenny Falconer, outlined the company's original scheduling method: "In addition to a Merlin Software's Caliburn ERP system, used for bills of materials and for working out required sizes of component parts of the windows and doors, we had always used white boards for basic scheduling. White boards had adequately met our scheduling needs in times when orders were coming in at a smaller rate. However, as orders increased, there came the time when we were in danger of losing control. We had no truly reliable visibility.

Everything we do needs to be driven by delivery date, and it was critical that we continued to honour these dates as accurately as possible, regardless of how busy we were. A batch of, say, 100 windows will take about eight weeks to work through the factory. That's fine and reasonably manageable. However, when you start to get 10 of these orders all around the same time, some could take 12 weeks and miss the specified lead time expected by the customer. If our building contractor customers had personnel lying idle because of the late delivery of our joinery goods we would probably not retain their business. Basically, we knew that our scheduling methodology had to be re-evaluated to prevent such a situation."

Back in late 2002  Kenny Falconer set about looking for the most suitable scheduling software solution to meet Geddes' needs: "What we wanted was an affordable system that could offer the flexibility to accurately reflect the choices we had on the factory floor without demanding weeks of training and a high cost outlay."

...and after: Implementation, training and usage
Kenny Falconer soon focused on Preactor reseller, RMS: "What RMS and Preactor offered stood out like a shining star. After preliminary discussions with RMS over the phone, and particularly after the live demo the company provided on our site, I realised that Preactor 300 was the ideal scheduling solution for our requirements. The user friendly Gantt chart format, the speed and convenience of the drag and drop functionality and the cost effectiveness of the system were the main factors in my decision to source the system."

Implementation of Preactor 300 began in early 2003. The configuration process took two days, with RMS onsite. Over the following few weeks, further adjustments and customisation took place as required via email and phone conversation between Falconer and RMS.

In terms of training, Falconer sat with RMS personnel for two days at Geddes' site. "Once the product templates were set up and I sat down ready to be shown the ropes, I realised just how much of a user-friendly system it really was. During the training I would occasionally fire a few questions for clarification, but the process was so quick that by the afternoon of the second day I was in the chair actively using the system, overseen by RMS," said Falconer.

For extra peace of mind, Geddes has a support and service agreement with RMS, which can be renewed on an annual basis. "The agreement is invaluable insofar as we are guaranteed hotline support as required, as well as upgrades as they become available," confirmed Falconer.

In the early stages of Preactor going live, Geddes used the system simply to flag-up late orders. "We would input all the data in the system to see which jobs were highlighted as being late and take remedial action. At any one time we are likely to have around 30 or 40 orders, and it is important for us to be able to prioritise based on promised delivery dates." Geddes also used the system to ensure the company could more easily provide accurate delivery date information when in receipt of an order enquiry.

Additional benefits
Prior to sourcing Preactor, Geddes could often see areas on the shop floor where there was a danger of a production bottleneck. However, the company couldn't always tell why they were likely to occur. "We couldn't really tell whether we were working on orders in the wrong sequence," said Falconer. "For example, it seems to be human nature that staff working on a particular order will complete three or four orders for the same product before changing to a new product, even though the second product might have a very short specified lead time. And depending on which mix of products currently being processed our bottlenecks would change."

With Preactor, Geddes can also see potential problems well ahead of time. "For instance, it might indicate that we will have a lack of paint in two weeks time if we don't buy in an adequate supply," Falconer pointed out. Also, Preactor can indicate when extra manpower will be required over the coming weeks. "This means we can give staff plenty or prior warning rather than ask them the day before if they would mind doing a few hours overtime," said Falconer. "And it's a great system to experiment with what-if' scenarios. From a business planning point of view, these scenarios allow us to see immediately what we would have to do to get production levels up comfortably, without any major constraints."

Final comment
All in all, the system has ensured that Geddes is able to keep on top of lead times in a highly efficient, largely stress-free manner. "As orders have recently picked up in a major way I don't know how we would cope effectively without Preactor" Falconer concluded.